For Reference, this article was finished on July 13th and because I took too long to send it in, it went unpublished.
You've probably seen them, people glued to their devices, oblivious of their surroundings, wholly unaware of the outside world. With their latest entry in the Pokemon franchise, Nintendo aims to change this.
Pokemon Go marks Nintendo's first major foray into the mobile market and the first Pokemon game available on non-Nintendo platforms. Go combines much of the tried-and-true Pokemon formula with GPS and AR technology, in a free-to-play format that is surprisingly reasonable.
While many successful mobile games use monetization and design choices that exploit the addictive qualities of users with purchasable lives, currency, and shortcuts, Nintendo has taken a more reasonable path. While users can choose to purchase consumables with real money, PokeStops- Which mirror landmarks littered through the world- allow users to stock up on these consumables without spending more than the energy it takes to reach them in real life. These PokeStops encourage users to visit the often overlooked landmarks in their towns and maybe even take a second to look up from their phones.
Users are also encouraged to find the Pokemon in their area, by following the Pokemon seen on their map, displayed with step icons that denote distance from the users. Mechanics like these echo the joy of exploration that defines the Pokemon games and TV show. People may still be glued to their phones but at least they are encouraged to explore their communities and able to interact with others in a manner that social networks like Twitter, Snapchat and others cannot replicate. Go has already surpassed some of these tech behemoths in number of daily users and daily screen time.
Nintendo shareholders seem even more bullish than users on the release of Pokemon Go. Stock has soared over 93 percent since the July 6th US release and rose 24 percent on July 11th.
At the release of their Wii console, Nintendo seemed to alter the landscape of console gaming. With time, motion gaming fizzled and Nintendo failed to parlay their Wii success into anything more than the mass adoption of Wii Sports. Pokemon Go has already summited the mountain of mobile gaming, only time can tell whether they have happened upon a fad or ushered in a new phase in mobile gaming.
Nintendo came under fire in recent years with the shaky release of the Nintendo 3DS and the failure of their Wii U home console. Pokemon Go leaves little doubt that Nintendo has forgotten how to produce quality software and Go can only gain more traction as Nintendo rolls out its international release.
Niantic spearheaded development for Pokemon Go, after the cult success of their GPS mobile game, Ingress. Pokemon Go functions with similar mechanics and some users have even reported the spawns of Pokemon mirroring those of Ingress.
While Niantic did create an enormously successful, and popular, game in Pokemon Go, they have struggled to handle the massive number of users. In high traffic hours, many users see a “Servers are down, try again later” more than they see pesky Pidgeys or other too common Pokemon. Server issues are expected with any major release, so users can only expect them to improve.
Pokemon was a fixture in the childhoods of recent generations. Go packages that nostalgia in rose-colored Alternate Reality that allows users to reconnect with the vivid imagination and wonder of their youth, with some bonus exercise.